The Treaty
by Castile181
Summary: AU alternate universe. First Age, year 80. After news of the kinslaying breaks, Doriath brokers a treaty with the princes of the House of Finwë in order to prevent war between the Sindar and the Noldor. As part of that treaty, a marriage is arranged between Celeborn, Prince of Doriath, and Artanis, Princess of Finwë's house. The only problem is they can't stand each other.
1. Chapter 1

**The Treaty**

Chapter 1

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 **Author's note:** I love arranged marriage AUs. It's super cliché but I'm not sorry. I hope you enjoy massive amounts of angst.

If you read In Cavern's Shade, I'm doing a lot of prewriting for the sequel to help me flesh out the locations, new characters, relationships, and plot points before I begin to publish the sequel. This fic was born of this process as a way for me to begin establishing the marital relationship between our favorite duo. You may see some other short fics or drabbles before I begin publishing my next long fic.

* * *

The ceremony was dull, tedious, and embarrassing, to tell the truth, Celeborn thought to himself, his teeth clenched together, a vein ticking in his temple in anger. He was supposed to be playing the part of the happy bridegroom, and of course everyone assumed that he must be overjoyed to have such a lovely bride. Their congratulations had been ringing in his ears for weeks now ever since Thingol had arranged the match.

But the truth of the matter was that Celeborn was furious. Artanis was perhaps the last woman on earth he would have ever chosen as his wife. Yes, she was astonishingly gorgeous, but everything about her personality irritated him to no end. He had no idea how he was supposed to go about living out his life for all eternity with such a prideful, petulant, antagonistic woman. And now his chances at love were effectively dead. He tried not to dwell on the thought, lest he sink into despair so deep that he would not be able to extricate himself.

After all, this was not without his consent. He had of course given Thingol his consent, just as she had given Finrod hers. The match would not have been able to proceed without it. Yet his consent had been given somewhat grudgingly. This was not what he wanted for himself but, for his kingdom, for Doriath, if this meant ensuring that war did not erupt between the Sindar and the Noldor, then he was willing to do it.

He turned back to her, taking her hands in his as Thingol wrapped a garland of flowers about their clasped hands, proclaiming them man and wife. Through a gossamer veil of gold silk, she stared at him with hateful and accusing eyes. He could hardly blame her. This hadn't been her choice either and he was sure that she was dreading tonight, just as he was.

She pulled her hands from his grasp as soon as the ceremony was over and Celeborn spent the entirety of the wedding feast trying to drink enough alcohol to prepare himself for what he was about to do but not so much as to hinder him from doing it. However; when he really thought about it, he didn't want to do it at all. They took her away first and he knew what they were doing, dressing her in the traditional garments, doing her makeup, letting her long golden hair down from the ornate braids into which it had been bound, preparing her for…that. He swallowed another goblet of wine. To delay any longer would be uncouth; he was supposed to be excited for this.

He stood, provoking a chorus of whistles and raucous cheers as he made his way from the hall. He merely grinned and nodded his thanks, as was expected, but privately he found something disturbing in the fact that all of these people were rejoicing in what he was about to do this woman, something he was certain she did not welcome.

The servants were gone, as expected, by the time he arrived, and he entered somewhat abruptly, furious with this whole situation, exhausted, wishing nothing more than to go to sleep. Artanis leapt to her feet and descended the stairs the second he entered. She had been sitting on the edge of the bed and, in the moment before she managed to pull the mask of anger over her face, he had seen fear in her eyes. Already feeling the effects of the alcohol he had perhaps unwisely indulged in, he reached for a pitcher and cup, pouring himself a glass of water and downing it.

She really was startlingly beautiful, he noted. Her lush golden hair fell in gentle waves to her hips, her eyes were azure as a mountain lake, her skin pale and smooth, her eyes had been rimmed in dark kohl, her elegant lips rouged. It wasn't just her face that was pretty, her figure was also very fine, lithe, slender, the soft swell of her hips. Her breasts were a bit on the small side, but, from here at least, they looked as though they were a very nice shape. The thin silks they had dressed her in left very little to the imagination.

He cleared his throat, trying to will his body not to rise in response, forcing himself to recall all of the things about her he despised, but she had noticed his lingering glance and wrapped her arms around herself protectively, a sour scowl twisting her lovely features.

"Listen," she began, and he could tell by her tone that this was a speech she had rehearsed, "I know we must do this. I've set my mind to it and I can manage. But I want to make it very clear that I do not intend to allow you free use of my body whenever you like it. Let us establish some sort of schedule for when we shall have…relations." She turned her nose up at the term. Prudery, another one of her flaws he had forgotten to note. "I shall perform my duties as established and I shall give you an heir, as set forth in the marriage contract. But otherwise I should like to sleep elsewhere."

"Sleep wherever you like," he replied, setting the glass down and sliding his hands into his pockets, "so long as it is in my rooms. You don't need to worry about the rest of it. I've no intention of consummating this marriage. But you must sleep here to at least keep up the pretense we've consummated it or else this whole painful charade will all be for nothing."

"Oh…" she was clearly surprised, her eyebrows shooting up, blue eyes going wide. And then, curiosity getting the better of her, she asked, "and why not consummate it?"

"You're the last woman on the face of this earth I want to be intimate with," Celeborn replied, filling his glass with water again. A series of emotions flitted across her face: relief, confusion, anger.

"And why not?" She asked again.

"Because I can't stand you," he replied, "and you can't stand me." Silence hung between them for a few moments but Celeborn didn't mind. He'd rather not talk to her at all, to be perfectly honest.

"Do you not find me beautiful?" She asked at last, raising her chin in what could only be described as an aristocratic fashion, and he nearly choked on the water.

"Trust you to be so arrogant," he laughed sardonically as her face flushed red with anger. "Of course I find you beautiful, but I'm quite unfond of your personality."

"I had every prince in Aman at my feet," she snarled, eyes flashing with ruined pride.

"Congratulations," Celeborn drawled. "Now you're married to me."

"You ought to be grateful," she snapped. "There are many men who would absolutely kill to be in your…"

"Well I'm not grateful," Celeborn cut her off. "And besides, I don't see why you should be upset about it anyway given that you do not desire this any more than I do, unless you were hoping I'd consummate it." He'd said it to get back at her for her pride.

"Of course not!" Her face ran the gamut of a vast array of reds, her eyes widening, nostrils flaring at his insolence. "There is nothing," she lifted her top lip in disgust, nose wrinkling, "nothing in the world I find more disgusting, more abhorrent, more revolting than the thought of….of…" she paused for a while and Celeborn wasn't sure if it was because she had run out of foul adjectives and was searching for another, or because she was too prudish to say the next bit, "…bedding a…a… _Moriquendi_." She finally finished.

Celeborn drew a deep breath to keep from throttling her beautiful neck. Racism – yet another despicable habit he had forgotten to attribute to her. He added it to his mental list of her faults. "So you'd have no objection if only I were a Calaquendi?" He spat back, saying it only because he wanted to get under her skin. The Quenya word tasted strange to hi s tongue.

"I would have every objection!" She hissed. "I'd have every objection in the world! I don't despise you because of what you are, but because of who you are: arrogant, crude, uncivilized, crass, antagonistic, uncultured, foul tempered, ignorant…" She showed every intention of continuing but Celeborn interrupted her.

"The rest I'll give you," he spat, pointing his finger in her face, "but I am not ignorant." She seemed to judge it better to remain silent and merely clenched her jaw in anger, tapping her elegantly slippered foot against the ground. Celeborn had had enough of speaking with her and set his glass down on a table, beginning to pull of the stiff wedding robes he wore and tossing them over the back of a low settee.

"What are you doing?" She asked, words tense, as if she feared he may have changed his mind.

"Going to bed," Celeborn said, stripping down to his breeches. "And you had better come with me…"

"You said we wouldn't!" She interrupted vehemently.

"I'm not going to touch you," he growled, struggling to keep his voice low. He had completely lost his patience with her and all he wanted to do was shout, but then the servants would hear and that would raise suspicion. He reined his temper back in. "You must at least pass the night in my bed or it will cast doubt on this farce of a wedding."

"You had better not touch me," she said, enunciating each syllable with perfect clarity, her eyes narrowed in furious suspicion.

"I've no interest whatsoever in touching you," he replied, taking his crown off and tossing it unceremoniously on a chair before he mounted the stairs to his sleeping chamber and threw himself down on the bed, rubbing his hands over his face. It took Artanis a few more minutes before she appeared, sour-faced as ever, arms crossed tightly over her chest, but when she reached the top of the stairs she merely stood there, not daring approach the bed.

Celeborn sighed. "I promise it is comfortable," he told her from where he lay.

"Aren't you going to put on a shirt?" She said, a distinct undercurrent of distaste in her voice, but the faint pink of a blush colored her cheeks and she dropped her gaze, which made Celeborn wonder if perhaps, physically at least, she did not find him quite so revolting as she had said.

"I never sleep with a shirt on," he replied. "But perhaps you should put something more on." The silken nightdress was quite thin, so thin that he could, without much difficulty, make out the shape and position of certain…things.

"Do you think I want to be wearing this?" She snapped. "I don't have anything else! They just dressed me up like I was…some…some sort of doll for your pleasure…" her voice trailed off and he saw a glimpse of embarrassment in her eyes. He felt something twist in the pit of his stomach, something he recognized as sympathy; it was the first time he had ever felt bad for her.

This was all very wretched for him but it must certainly be worse for her. At least he had the choice of whether or not he wished to bed her. Had he desired her there would have been very little she could have done about it, even unwilling as she was; but he wasn't that sort of man, and yet of course she didn't know that. She had nothing to go on save his word, the word of a man she knew hardly at all.

"Come on," he said quietly, slipping from bed and, with a rough gesture of his hand for her to follow him, padded back down the stairs. He heard her following. "Here," he reached to pick up the shirt he had discarded but, upon seeing the way she wrinkled her nose, reconsidered the notion. "Ah…. a clean one perhaps," he mumbled, pulling the largest one he could find from his wardrobe and pushing it into her arms. He mounted the stairs again, seating himself upon the bed once more, and momentarily she appeared, dressed now in his shirt, her wedding night finery clutched in her arms. She dropped the silken slip on the floor, pulling off the myriad bangles that adorned her wrists and ankles and casting them about, at last unfastening her jewels and letting those drop to the floor as well.

"You could be more tidy," Celeborn grumbled with a raised eyebrow. She shot him a look of hatred.

"I'm keeping up our façade," she spat, "as you said. Best to make it look as though we enjoyed ourselves."

"Oh," he grunted in response, lying down and pulling the covers up about him. His new wife moved to sit on the opposite side of the bed and, at last, slipped beneath the covers as well, seeming to make a conscious effort to stay as far from him as possible. Silence prevailed for a long while and then he said. "I'll have one of the other rooms in my chambers prepared for you, that's ordinary enough amongst arranged couples, but I think it would be best if you passed the night with me once every few weeks so that rumors don't surface."

She merely nodded in response. "Of course," he said, "I won't touch you. I have no intention of it." She nodded again and once more the room grew silent.

"We'll have to eventually," she said, "in…in the contract I'm obligated to provide you an heir…"

Celeborn sighed. "Maybe…maybe we can find some way to end this," he said. "And there's always the possibility I'll be killed in battle."

"That's morbid," she murmured with distaste.

"I thought you wanted to be rid of me?" He asked.

"Yes, but I don't wish you dead," she said.

"Warming up to me are you?" He tested a joke but she didn't smile. "Well if we eventually have to then we'll plan it," he told her, "so that we can both be ready, mentally I mean. And if you wish to drink yourself into a stupor so that you won't remember it then I won't hold it against you. I'll try to…get it over with as fast as I'm able." She nodded again and the conversation lapsed into silence. Celeborn rolled over and put out the candles, plunging the room into darkness.

He lay there for a very long while before he was able to sleep, his heart heavy with a profound sense of disappointment. This wasn't at all what he wanted and he couldn't think of how to go on, how he would live his entire life without love, without affection, without… well… other things. He could imagine the other soldiers mocking him for his thoughts, after all, Artanis was supposed to be some sort of much-sought-after prize. But this wasn't at all what he had wanted in a marriage… in life. He had wanted a partner, an equal, someone who smiled when he walked into the room, who yearned for his touch. And certainly he had wanted the physicality of it as well, had longed for it, and now it seemed as it that too would be a purely unpleasant endeavor.

He sighed into the silence, which was when he became aware of the fact that the bed seemed to be shaking ever so slightly. His Sindarin eyes were keen in the dark and, looking over at his bride, he saw that her shoulders were trembling and knew she was sobbing silently to herself. Perhaps this had all been a horrid mistake. But what other choice had they had? Their nations had come to the brink of war and this marriage, however miserable it might be for the two of them, would save countless elven lives.

He glanced over at her again, forced to admit to himself that he did feel quite bad for her. He was sure that no woman ever dreamed that her wedding night would be like this, but then again, he hadn't either.


	2. Chapter 2

**The Treaty**

Chapter 2

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The sound of tittering giggles were what woke her and, for a blissful moment, Artanis felt as though everything was normal and then, in that horrible instant of waking cognizance, she remembered that yesterday had been her wedding, last night her (uneventful) wedding night, and that today was her first day as the wife of Doriath's crown prince.

She squeezed her eyes shut, feeling the oncoming tears burning at her eyes, trying to will them away. Artanis was not usually prone to weeping but this… this whole situation was so heart-shatteringly wretched that weeping was all that she wished to do.

She sat up in bed, keeping quiet so as not to disturb _him_ …her husband in name only, and thankfully so. That, at least, had been some blessing, some providence of the Valar. Yet, strangely enough the thought made her both sad and glad.

Of course she was very happy that she had not been forced to lie with him, just the very thought of it turned her stomach. She found nearly every aspect of his personality despicable, and then there was the fact that he was a _Moriquendi_. She shuddered at the very idea of being touched so intimately by one of them. Having to hold his hands during the ceremony had been horrid enough, but the idea of him overtop of her… taking his pleasure in her body. She could feel her skin crawling at the perversity of it.

And yet… it could not be put off forever. Eventually they would have to…they must… her family and his family would begin to ask why she was not with child. But at least they had managed to delay it for a while. That had certainly surprised her. After all of the bawdy jokes, crass gestures, and uncouth conversations she had heard him having over various feasts and banquets, she would have expected a man like him to be overly eager to consummate his marriage. And yet he had been the one to call it off.

For some mysterious reason, that irritated her. She wanted him to have been left longing. She wanted him to have been left yearning for even a glimpse of her shoulder. She wanted him to have begged her to sate the lustful hunger gnawing at his belly and, in the same moment, she would have utterly and irrevocably refused him. Instead, he had not desired her in the slightest, and it had injured her pride most horribly. She wanted him to want her while she did not want him, perhaps because she wanted to destroy him.

She crossed her arms over her chest primly, glancing towards where he lay. The oaf, even the way he slept was inelegant and uncouth, spread eagled, his long limbs going this way and that, his long silver hair a tangled mess, mouth open. She uttered a soft sound of disgust and looked away. Still… when he was properly dressed and presented he wasn't bad to look at. He could even be called handsome… in a way… in a way that Moriquendi men could be called handsome… which of course was to say in a far inferior manner to the princes of Aman.

The giggling voices were drawing nearer now and Artanis's eyes opened wide with terror. No! They were coming for the bed sheets…the bed sheets that were still white as snow! She elbowed her husband hard and he jerked awake, glaring at her angrily and rubbing his ribs where she had hit him.

"Vixen, you don't have to assault me to get my attention," he spat.

"They're coming for the sheets!" She hissed and he looked at her as if she had lost her mind completely.

"Why are they taking the sheets?" He asked.

"You idiot!" She cried, losing all patience with him. "It was my cousins. They wanted proof of the marriage."

"A stupid and pointless Noldorin tradition," Celeborn grumbled, rolling over and pulling a pillow over his head. "I doubt you even have a maidenhead to lose." Her eyes flew open even wider at the perceived slight and she tore the pillow free of his gasp, staring him down as a bull might.

"I will have you know," she said, trembling in rage, "that I have _never_ lain with a man and I _will not_ allow the likes of _you_ to call my virtue into question!"

"That's not what I meant!" Celeborn retorted, equally as furious. "I just meant you're athletic! Only lazy girls who sit around doing nothing bleed the first night!"

"Oh I bet you know all about that!" Artanis hissed.

"Well excuse me!" Celeborn fired back. "I have some standards. I'm not the lecher you think I am!"

"Give me your knife!" She demanded. She knew he had one. All of the Sindarin men carried them, armed to the teeth like savages.

"Happily if it means you're going to put me out of my misery!" Celeborn retorted, retrieving the curved blade from a small table nearby. "I'd prefer death to another instant of your incessant dramatics."

"Me?" She asked, snapping up the knife from his hand and unsheathing it. "You're the one asking for death! You're the dramatic one!" Taking a deep breath to prepare for the pain, she positioned the blade at her inner thigh.

"What in Eru's name do you think you're doing!" Celeborn hissed, halting her cut just in the nick of time as he grabbed her elbow and held her arm still. Silence prevailed for a long while in which they both attempted to recover from the shock. "You've an artery there, Artanis! You'll bleed out!" He whispered frantically. She glanced up, her eyes meeting his, and they stared at each other for a moment, not in hatred this time, but in fear. Hand trembling, she released the grip on the knife.

"Somewhere…somewhere no one will see…" she said softly. Celeborn nodded in understanding and gently lifted her foot, pressing the blade to the sole. The knife was so sharp that she barely felt him cut her, but a moment later she was bleeding profusely.

"The foot is vascular," Celeborn murmured, pressing the bed sheet to her foot to quench the bleeding, "and thus produces a great deal of blood if cut, but it is not a critical wound, not the way it would be if you nicked an artery."

Now here she was looking the foolish one of the two of them and Artanis's pride rebelled against it. "And what are you?" She sneered, mocking him, "some sort of healer?"

"No," Celeborn replied, dabbing at her foot now that the bleeding had stopped, "but I am a soldier and I have seen enough of my wardens cut down that I know which wounds will kill and which will not."

"Oh," she said softly, feeling duly chastised now. It was easy sometimes to forget that Celeborn's obnoxious overabundance of confidence was not the result of a lack of tragedy, but existed in spite of it. She had heard stories… about what had happened to his parents…

"Hurry," Celeborn muttered, "they're coming. Let's make it look like we have actually done this." He pulled the sheet from the bed, draping it over the corner, and then drew the blanket overtop of them, pulling Artanis in close and holding her tightly.

She was startled by his sudden proximity, by the warmth of him, the scent of him like fresh pines, by the way she could feel the beat of his heart in his chest. She swallowed hard. "I'm sorry," she whispered, because she still felt bad about mocking him a moment earlier, "about what I said." It seemed to take him a minute to realize what she was speaking about.

"I didn't know you were capable of an apology," he replied quietly, his tone a bit bitter, but not entirely unkind. The conversation lapsed into silence for a moment.

"Do you…do you think the blood is too fresh to fool them?" She whispered, looking into his eyes, but his face was so close that she quickly looked away again.

"I don't think they'll much mind how fresh it is," he said, "so long as they have their proof and their damned treaty. Besides, who in their right mind would believe I didn't do it?"

"So you admit it," she said, a sense of satisfaction welling in her stomach, a small grin curling her lips. "You think I'm desirable."

"I don't want to talk about this," Celeborn mumbled gruffly. The servant girls had entered, crowned in flowers still from the wedding festivities. The parties must have gone on to the very early hours of the morning. Giggling and casting curious but bashful glances, they mounted the stairs.

Celeborn pressed his forehead to his bride's, smiling and softly kissing her cheek, an action that earned another volley of giggles from the ladies. Artanis tried her best to play along, gazing into her husband's eyes in what she hoped was a loving manner, reaching up to brush his silver hair behind his ear. His hair really was lovely, like the stars.

Celeborn shifted, rolling onto his back and gently pressing Artanis's head to his chest as he pointed to the sheets. "There," he said, with a laugh and a grin at the handmaidens, "you'll find your proof, though I can't fathom why they need it. Have you seen how beautiful she is?" And Artanis suddenly found his lips pressed to hers, which earned them shrieks and giggles from the ladies. But Artanis felt as if she were underwater, the silence of the ocean rushing into her ears, time slowing, slowing further still, creeping to a stop. His lips were warm, yielding, and then in the next instant they were gone and she found herself suddenly short of breath.

She heard the door close behind the girls and took a deep breath, confused, her mind spinning, wondering why she wasn't furious with Celeborn for having kissed her. But of course he was only keeping up appearances, putting on a show, and….and…it had felt…nice… so long as she didn't think about the fact that it was _him_ , a _Moriquendi_. But, from a purely objective point of view… if she closed her eyes and pretended it was someone else… it had been an excellent kiss. Celeborn seemed not to have noticed her confusion, but now, pressed up against him, she had noticed something else.

"Are you…" she pushed herself away from him, scurrying to the other side of the bed, "are you….er…are you… hard?" She swallowed, embarrassed that she had had to give voice to _that_ word.

Celeborn laughed as if it were no matter. "It's nothing to do with you in particular," he told her, his eyes meeting hers, an infuriating grin on his lips. "it would happen to any man who had any mostly naked woman pressed up against him."

"That's vile!" Artanis hissed with a shiver of distaste. "Absolutely revolting!" The Sindarin style of humor did not suit her at all and Celeborn's humor was particularly crude. He rolled out of bed, stretched, and then promptly reached into his breeches and scratched himself, as if he were a common woodsman instead of a prince. Artanis recoiled in disgust. He was positively foul.

"Let us make at least some attempt to be civil towards one another in public," he said, turning towards her, "for the sake of appearances. And, I'll have one of the spare rooms prepared for you today," he told her. "As for the rest of it…come to my bed when you see fit, perhaps every two weeks, no maybe every week…so it looks like we're actually trying." He shrugged, his expression grim. "You have my assurance that I will not touch you."

"I'm honestly surprised you could resist," she said, unable to resist baiting him. "What with your crudeness I had half expected you'd be… eager to have me."

"I don't believe in that," Celeborn said, his voice low and angry, his eyes flashing with ire. "Even if you had been willing, purely for the sake of the alliance, it still would have felt…wrong. If I am with a woman in that way then I want it to be because she desires me…not because she is being forced."

"They sold me as if I were…. as if I were an animal," she stammered, the words coming loose from the wall of her soul, falling out into the open.

Celeborn turned, looking at her for a long moment. "They did the same to me," he said quietly.

"Then why did you agree to it?" She glared at him with accusing eyes. All along she had thought that it was because he desired her, that it was merely a convenient way to have her as he wanted, but last night she had been proven wrong. He had been true to his word; he had not touched her.

"To prevent war from coming to Doriath," he said quietly, sliding his hands into his pockets as he faced her. It was, she noted, perhaps the first honest conversation the two of them had ever had. "Thingol…he is my king, and I am loyal to him, but he wanted to avenge the kinslaying at Alqualondë, Artanis. He wanted blood paid for in blood. With you married to me he has ample assurance that the Feanorians will not repeat their actions." He shrugged. "Had I not agreed, war would have come. So many would have died… but you did it for the same reason, did you not?"

She nodded stiffly. The Feanorians had been clamoring for blood, paranoid that, now that Thingol knew what they had done, he would wage war upon them, seek to drive them from their lands. Long had they desired some sort of political leverage over Thingol, some strong tie to bind Doriath to them; now they had it. And then… of course they had wanted the proof. Trust Caranthir to demand such a thing. They never would have believed Thingol's word otherwise, had to see for themselves that the bargain had been signed in her blood.

She drew a shuddering breath, feeling the tears coming on again as they had last night, but she would not cry, not in front of Celeborn. That was an embarrassment she would not suffer. But Celeborn seemed to have sensed her unease and caught her gaze. "About the sheets," he said, "that was barbaric and I'm sorry they made you do it." Then he turned on his heel and was gone.


	3. Chapter 3

**The Treaty**

Chapter 3

* * *

The bay gelding was a bit skittish, shying as a flock of birds erupted from a nearby stand of maples. But Celeborn clucked, feeding more slack into the lunge line and gently snapping the tip of the lunge whip across the ground. They horse acquiesced and then a moment later seemed to have forgotten his earlier fright, cantering about happily.

Perhaps, Celeborn mused, there was some hope for this animal after all. He may never have the temperament of a warhorse, but he could, with a bit of work, make a fine steed for a hunt. After all, he was such a fine looking creature, and of such sound conformation, that it would have been a shame to resign him to pulling carts or some other such nonsense.

He clucked again, sweeping the lunge whip across the earth, bidding the horse turn and continue about the circle in the other direction. He obeyed, not without a bit of a kick, and Celeborn laughed. To tell the truth, he preferred his horses with a bit of spirit. He rocked back onto his heels, putting his weight on the lunge line, and the horse pulled right back, snorting and tossing his head. He let the line go completely slack and the horse turned in, slowing to a walk, stopping just before him and pushing his nose into Celeborn's tunic, rubbing his face against the elf's chest.

"You're not hopeless after all, are you?" The prince laughed, patting the horse on the neck and scratching his ears. The animal was clearly pleased and stamped his feet happily, swishing his tail against the summer flies. A pleasant breeze blew through the treetops and Celeborn closed his eyes for a moment, letting the peace of nature wash over him. This was what he loved best, when he could simply be alone in the woods, away from the bustle of the city, from the duties that pulled his attention in a thousand directions.

In fact, he was so at peace that even opening his eyes and catching sight of his wife, sitting on the fence, did not manage to perturb him overly much. He merely raised a hand in greeting. She had a particular penchant for dressing in laboriously embroidered silk gowns and a treasury's worth of jewels, a habit he had chalked up to Noldorin greed, but at the moment she was wearing a simple cotton gown of green, made all the greener by the way it contrasted with the deep gold of her hair, which hung in a long braid. Of course, he supposed he shouldn't be surprised. He had heard, after all, that she often participated in foot races in Aman, even outrunning the men, and yet he wondered why she no longer partook in such events, what had stopped her.

Married life had hardly served to make him any fonder of her, indeed, he did not see her so very often now that she had her own bedchamber within his rooms. Still, they did pass each other coming and going, and they had managed to strike up a civil manner towards each other when in public, and she spent a night each week in his bed, as they had agreed upon, a night where they carefully avoided each other and conversation, each keeping to the edge of their side of the bed.

However, despite his general dislike of her, he had to admit that he liked this simple manner of dress better than the ornate styles she usually adopted. It made her look softer somehow…and wilder, as if she were hiding some side of her he had not yet seen, some side of her that longed to break free of prudish social convention.

She dropped from the fence, petticoats swishing about her ankles, and approached him, her arms crossed over her chest, but her expression was not antagonistic.

"New style?" He asked her.

"I didn't want to soil anything worth wearing by coming out here," she replied.

"It suits you," he told her and her eyes snapped up to his, golden brows surging down into a frown.

"Are you saying I look like a peasant?" She asked and Celeborn nearly sighed, shaking his head in annoyance. Why did she have to make everything so difficult?

"That isn't at all what I said," he retorted. "I was trying to pay you a compliment and you're taking it out of context." He nearly remarked upon her damnable Noldorin pride but stopped his tongue at the last second, deeming it wiser.

She pursed her lips, shaking her golden head. "You would prefer simpler things…" she murmured.

"And what's that supposed to mean exactly?" He said, his turn now for ire.

"Nothing in particular," she told him, but he could imagine all of the prejudices flitting through her mind like birds in flight, all sorts of notions of the Sindar being simple and therefore ignorant.

"All I wanted to say was that you look…" he cleared his throat, "pretty," he said gruffly. He wished he hadn't said it because Artanis immediately looked uncomfortable and that wasn't what he had intended to accomplish. He looked away and then back at her. She uncrossed her arms and then crossed them back over her chest.

"I came to tell you I've had word from my cousins," she said, a tremor of distaste running through her voice and he noticed that what he had said may have made her uncomfortable, but not nearly so much as speaking about her cousins did.

"Oh?" He asked, not quite understanding what she was referencing.

"About the… the sheets…" she stammered, clearly embarrassed. She flushed red and Celeborn looked away briefly, giving her a moment to recoup her self respect. The whole business with the sheets had been dreadful and he was not particularly keen on speaking of it, but he knew they must.

"I never imagined that my bed sheets would become such a topic of interest," he snorted with laughter. "Were they fooled?" He asked her. She shrugged, her face impassive.

"It seemed they were," she said, pausing for a long while before she admitted, "it helped that they apparently heard how I could hardly walk after."

"Ah!" Celeborn exclaimed, bursting into laughter. He hadn't thought of that, but perhaps cutting her foot had been an even wiser choice than he had realized. He kept trying to stop but the more and more he thought about it, the funnier the idea of proud, prudish Artanis limping about and being subjected to the speculatively raised eyebrows of curious courtiers gladdened his heart. He dared to glance in her direction and found himself greeted, as he had expected, by a look as sour as if she had just drunk curdled milk.

It really wasn't something he should be joking about; he knew that. Only, the entire situation was so helpless, so wretched, that it seemed there was nothing to be done about the situation save laugh.

"You didn't tell them all about our wild and steamy wedding night?" Celeborn asked with a grin, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Artanis's face was blank for a moment and then, astonishingly, he heard the small snort of a laugh and glanced over to see a grin flit across her face briefly before disappearing again.

"Well of course I wasn't allowed to write the letter," she said. "My brothers wrote it for me, so I am not entirely sure what they might have implied and what they might have left out, but whatever they wrote, my cousins seem suitably convinced."

"Too proud to write it yourself?" Celeborn chided her. She rounded on him, her eyes blazing in fury.

"Don't you think I would rather have written it myself?" She hissed. "Don't you think I should have been the one to tell my tale? Don't you think I wanted it to be me? It was _my_ wedding after all, _my_ wedding night! Only it wasn't mine, not really. It was theirs! I was just something to be bought and traded. Do you think they would ever have done this to Aredhel, to Idril? Of course not! They don't want to be rid of them! But I'm nothing to them but a Telerin half breed, an annoying thorn in their consciences, the girl who looks too much like the grandmother they hated, the only person who stood up to their dreadful father!"

The words tumbled from her mouth in a steady stream, her voice growing hoarse, tears welling in the corners of her eyes and Celeborn stared on, wide-eyed, surprised that she was telling him any of this. "They hate me…" she said, her voice growing quieter, "and they've been trying to think of a way to punish me for the longest time. What a perfect opportunity they found!" She laughed sardonically, mocking her fate. "They knew I would not refuse, that I'd have done anything to prevent another Alqualondë…" she drew a deep, shuddering breath. "I wanted to write it myself!" She spat. "But my story isn't mine to tell. It belongs to them, just as I do."

"You don't," Celeborn replied.

"I know," she snarled quietly, her eyes, fierce and angry, meeting his. "Now I belong to _you_."

It was true, legally speaking. That wasn't what he had meant, but it was true. It was the way she saw things and she was right, even if he didn't like it. He took a deep breath and released it.

"I don't want your pity," she spat as an afterthought. "Pity is for the weak." But there was shame in her eyes and he knew that she regretted spilling her heart out to him, whom she despised, that it had been an accident. She didn't trust him, didn't even like him, of course she would not have wished him to know such private things, and yet… he found that some of his dislike for her had dissipated.

Celeborn deemed it wisest to say nothing, but merely reached out to pat the horse. The animal shook his head and then pushed his face into Artanis's stomach. He would have expected her to shriek in disgust, but instead she merely grunted softly at the horse's friendly overtures and reached out to rub the side of his face.

He wasn't quite sure what possessed him to do it, but Celeborn found himself pushing the lunge line and whip into her hands. She took them, looking up at him questioningly, but there was at least no scorn, no hatred in her eyes now. "Do you know how?" He asked.

"Of course I know how!" Artanis retorted in a tone that seemed to say, _how dare you question my expertise_. But he saw a current of mild regret swim through her eyes and then she said, softer, kinder. "Yes, yes I know how."

She took a step back, measuring out the line, flicking the tip of the whip across the dirt, and the gelding moved into a trot, circling them as she continued to put slack into the line. Celeborn watched the horse move with a smile. He did have a very smooth gait.

"Your horse?" Artanis asked without looking at him, her eyes focused on the animal's movement as he cantered now in ever widening circles.

"Somewhat by accident," Celeborn told her. "He's young, barely three, still a colt really. Thingol had high hopes for him. He was sired by the king's finest warhorse, out of the kingdom's best broodmare."

"Yes I can see he is very well bred," Artanis remarked, and Celeborn thought he saw the hint of a smile on her face. The horse was fine indeed, his coat a rich glossy reddish-brown, his mane and tail very thick, of hair dark as midnight, a white blaze running down the center of his elegant face, his body well muscled, of sound constitution. "And Thingol didn't want him anymore?"

"He says he has an 'attitude problem', too much spirit," Celeborn said with a laugh, folding his hands behind his back and moving with Artanis as the horse circled them. She clucked, sweeping the whip across the earth, and the horse turned, moving now in the opposite direction. "The King gave up on him, had him gelded, told me I could have him if I wanted," he told her. "Else he was going to use him as a carthorse." Celeborn shrugged. "But I like a horse with spirit and it would have done my heart ill to see such a magnificent animal used for carts and carriages."

As if he knew they were speaking of him, the horse bucked, changing directions of his own accord and breaking into an unruly canter, but Artanis gently checked him with the whip and he resumed his earlier more measured pace.

"You're quite good with him," Celeborn said, noting that she handled the horse with natural ease.

"My grandmother, Indis, is a renowned horsewoman," Artanis replied. "She taught me." They were silent then for a while, simply enjoying the feel of the summer breeze and the rustling of the trees. "I think Thingol is right in that he will never do as a warhorse," Artanis said at last, "but he has potential to be a hunter. It would be a shame to waste that."

"You know, that is exactly what I was thinking earlier," Celeborn told her.


	4. Chapter 4

**The Treaty**

Chapter 4

* * *

It was late in the day by the time she finally returned to their rooms. She had rather made a habit of it. The Sindar kept nocturnal hours and so by waking during the day she usually managed to avoid her husband entirely and yet, ever since last they had spoken she had found that she was starting to not mind his company as much as she once had.

 _Of course, that wasn't to say she enjoyed his company_ , she was quick to correct her own thoughts, only that she was now able to spend time with him without wishing him ill will. Quickly, she ran through all of his most vulgar and offensive jokes in her mind, forced herself to recall all of the most ignorant things he had said, all the times he had wounded her pride, all to reassure herself that she was certainly _not_ growing fond of him.

She shuddered at the thought. _Him – a dark elf_. Her cousins had done it to embarrass her, to humiliate her, to laugh at the thought of her wed to a _Moriquendi_. She nodded in thanks to the handmaidens that helped her undress and slip into her chemise, but was glad when they left her in peace. She stretched with a sigh, recalling the horse, wondering if Celeborn had ever managed to turn him into a suitable hunter.

Pulling the covers back, she made to slip into bed, but the blankets felt unusually heavy and, with a frown, she glanced down to see a heavy leather bound book sitting atop them. It was blue, the same color as the blankets, which was why she must have missed it. Picking it up, she slid beneath the covers and opened it, wondering how it had come to be there and what it might be, but the pages were all blank, thick ivory parchment with not a single word inscribed upon them. Confused, she thumbed through it, finding nothing until she came to the first page and, written there was 'Artanis's Story'. That was all it said.

She stared at the letters for a moment in complete surprise. Whatever she might have expected, it certainly hadn't been this. And, she knew immediately who had written it not only because of what it said - because the only person she had ever told about her frustrations had been Celeborn - but also because the writing was sloppy and her name had been misspelled.

He'd written it in tengwar, an alphabet he was only passingly familiar with, an alphabet whose use would doubtlessly have earned him Thingol's rage if Thingol knew he had written it, rather than Sindarin cirth. Tengwar… she reached out, brushing her fingers across the dried ink…her language…her alphabet.

The letters showed signs of having been written with great care, despite their sloppiness, the way that children wrote in their primers when they were first learning language. And of course he would have misspelled it, being unable to speak or write Quenya, but he had tried…he had tried. The practice of the fine arts was not something in which he had ever showed any interest, a habit for which she had often derogated him, and yet she could imagine him struggling over the letters by candlelight, trying painstakingly to write each one as perfectly as he was able.

She brushed her fingers across the words again. So many times she had made fun of him, called him an illiterate _Moriquendi_ , even to his face. Of course he had fought back, Celeborn was not the type to take a blow without giving one in return. And she had reveled in his anger, in knowing that she had gotten under his skin, that she had humiliated him, all part of her quest to impress upon him that the Noldor were far superior to his people, that she was far superior to him,

Guilt settled into her bones. She knew of course that he wasn't ignorant. After all, he was Thingol's heir, the heir to a kingdom far larger than Tirion, and he had had the finest education that Thingol's money could buy…and Thingol's money could buy quite a bit. And, of course he was literate in Doriathrin, his native language, and in common Sindarin, in Green Elven, in the language of the Mithrim and several Avarin dialects besides. In fact…he knew far more languages than she did and what did it matter if he did not know Quenya? He had no use for it. And even more, what did it matter if he cared not for the study of letters and literature? He excelled, or so she had heard, at strategy, at tactics, and he knew more about the land than she could ever hope to.

She was surprised to find herself making excuses for him as she slipped from her bed, carrying one thin flaming taper with her as she made her way back through the maze of his chambers and at last to the stairs that led to his bed. She climbed them imagining that she must have gone completely out of her mind; even she didn't know what she was doing.

Predictably, he was asleep and, taking a deep breath, she sat beside him on the bed, watching the way that the light of the candle danced across his skin. There was something about him…she didn't know what…she'd called it oafish in the past but now it didn't seem so… some sense of comfortable ease about him, even in sleep. Every line and plane of his body seemed to say _I don't care what you think of me_. And, where before she had taken it as an affront… now… now it was… well she didn't know what it was but it fascinated her – who had always been so very concerned of how she was perceived.

He shifted, a frown flitting across his features, and he blinked his eyes open groggily. "Oh! I'm sorry!" She exclaimed softly, realizing it must have been the light of the candle that had woken him.

"Artanis?" He asked, staring at her in confusion, as if he could not fathom why on earth she would be here and, to tell the truth, she didn't know either. "Is something the matter?" Of course, of course that was the logical assumption. Why else would she be here unless something was the matter? Why would she ever have come to his bed of her own free will? She took a deep breath, surprised at herself, unsure of what to say, how to explain her presence.

"No! No!" She stammered, pushing the candle onto a table with a trembling hand. "I…no…nothing is the matter I just…" her mind searched for an answer to her own actions. "I was wondering what ever happened with your horse is all."

"Ah!" He laughed softly, grinning, some sort of mischief sparking in the depths of his eyes. Even in the candlelight she could see that they were very green. "He threw me," he said. "Actually, he has thrown me quite a few times."

"Oh dear," she laughed, "so he didn't work out after all as a hunter?"

"Oh no, he's a splendid hunter," Celeborn told her. "I prefer a bit of a challenge you see. If I had the perfect horse why… it would be too easy for me. Now I never know if I'll be thrown or not. Adds a bit of fun to the sport."

"That's an odd definition of fun," she said with a hint of a smile. The conversation lapsed into silence and, embarrassed, she took up the candle again, making her way to the stairs.

"Good night," she heard Celeborn call and she paused at the head of the stairs. For some completely irrational and incomprehensible reason… she found that she felt lonely and that… tonight at least… she did not wish to be alone. After all, since she had come to Doriath she had always been completely alone. Taking a deep breath she turned, making her way back to the bed, pushing the candle onto a table as she sat down on her side.

Celeborn looked startled. "It…it's not the day that we arranged…" he began, confused. And it wasn't, it wasn't the one day per week that she spent in his bed by obligation, curled up on the edge, far away from him. But she had forgotten that he did not want her here, forgotten that she was intruding. Embarrassed, wondering what on earth had possessed her, she leapt from the bed and caught up the candle, nearly running to the stairs.

"My apologies," she gasped.

"Artanis!" Celeborn had leapt from the bed too, his hand catching the crook of her elbow, turning her towards him. They stood for a moment, staring at each other wide-eyed. "Stay." He said simply. She could feel her heart beating in her throat, was completely unable to understand why she had come here, why she had tried to leave, or what might have caused him to ask her to stay.

She nodded numbly, returning to her side of the bed, pushing the candle back onto the table, and slipping beneath the covers as he did the same. But there was some strange tension now between them, as if they had suddenly wandered into uncharted territory. She lay there, her heart pounding, and yet the tension did not dissipate, but seemed to grow and grow as she wondered what madness had possessed her to do this, what on earth she had been hoping to accomplish.

"You found the book…" Celeborn said quietly. She nodded in the dark.

"Yes," she said.

"I'm sorry," he replied. "It was a stupid idea. I've made you feel obligated…"

"No," she cut him off. "No. Have you ever known me to do anything out of obligation?"

"You married me out of obligation," he said.

"That's not what I meant," she said, realizing she had said the wrong thing. "You misspelled my name." That had been the wrong thing too.

"Like I said, a stupid idea," Celeborn said, his voice low and bitter.

"No," she replied. "I like it. I like it very much. And I… I appreciate…" she paused. It was perhaps the first time she had ever told someone she appreciated something they had done for her. Maybe she was as arrogant as Celeborn claimed. "I appreciate that you wrote in…in Quenya… in Tengwar…."

"Don't ever tell Thingol that. He'll have my head," Celeborn said, his words bitter with regret, clearly still thinking she meant to mock him for his moment of uncharacteristic sentimentality.

"That's what I'm trying to say," she told him. "You needn't….you needn't do that. It's…alright… if you write in Sindarin, in cirth. I don't mind." Silence lay between them for a while.

"But you hate Sindarin," Celeborn said at last, and yet his voice had lost its edge. This time he was seeking an answer.

"Maybe…maybe not as much as I thought," she replied. She was still trembling with nerves and she swallowed hard. She heard Celeborn swallow too.

"Maybe I don't hate Quenya as much as I thought either," he replied.


	5. Chapter 5

**The Treaty**

Chapter 5

* * *

"Celeborn," he heard Artanis chiding him gently for a joke that had perhaps not been very suitable for such a formal affair as the banquet they were at. He glanced over at her, duly chastised, but still unable to keep the grin from his face. And Artanis's eyes weren't so impassive either. He had seen the merriment in their depths and knew that she had also found it funny, just that this might not be the proper venue for insinuations about Oropher's father and his herd of sheep.

It was strange, he thought. It used to irritate him when she did such things but now… well now he found that he had rather come to rely upon it. He did have a habit of being inappropriate at times and Artanis had a knack for helping him pick up on social cues that he used to be unable to recognize. In the beginning she had been obnoxiously strict about it, taking offense to every off color comment he made. But in recent months she seemed to have softened somewhat, to have allowed some of her prudery to slip away, and now she only reproached him when necessary, and did so less viciously at that.

If he had to pinpoint a moment when things had changed he would have had to say it was the night she had come to his bed. Though it had never happened again, and they had resumed their usual schedule, things had never quite been the same after. That wasn't to say that they didn't fight anymore. But perhaps they fought a little less now. They were almost…dare he say…friendly. He glanced over at her once more. She had a goblet pressed to her lips and he could see that it was disguising her smile.

"At least your wife has good breeding." The unpleasant but familiar voice of Saeros drew his attention away from Artanis. The counselor was sneering at him, his eyes narrowed in distaste. Celeborn could not recall a time when Saeros _had not_ hated him. "Not all of us act as if we were sired by orcs." The surrounding elves went silent, no one daring to speak. Everyone knew what had happened to Celeborn's parents but nobody had ever dared say it before.

Celeborn could feel himself trembling in rage, overwhelmed by the desire to strike the king's counselor, but his wife's touch on his arm staid his fist. "Come along," she whispered to him, "he isn't worth your anger. Let us be gone from here." He needed no further urging, taking up his glass of wine from the table and striding from the hall, at last slipping through a curtain of ivy to take refuge in a hidden alcove, a balcony that overlooked the expansive underground gardens of Menegroth.

He drained half of the cup in a single swallow but then felt Artanis's strong fingers prying it from his hand. "You drink too much," she said in a low voice.

"Why shouldn't I?" He responded, knowing he was being deliberately antagonistic, but arguing with his wife grounded him, made him feel as if everything were normal. He rounded on her, though he knew she did not deserve his wrath. "What do I have to look forward to in my life? I've no family left remaining to me save my brother and it certainly doesn't look as though I'll be having a family of my own, married to a woman who has no regard for me…"

"I have a great deal of regard for you!" Artanis snapped, her eyes fierce, her expression sour, and his anger abated. "But not when you act like this!" He fell silent, her words having surprised him more than a little. "Sometimes you can be so damnably stubborn!" She fumed. He considered pointing out that the same could be said of her but reconsidered it. For the second time that night she had chastised him and this time he knew he had deserved it.

"My apologies," he said after a moment of silence. "I spoke in the trouble of my heart." His wife nodded stiffly, crossing her arms over her chest. "I didn't…mean to ruin things…" he said haltlingly. They had been getting along quite well lately and he was loath to undo what progress they had painstakingly made.

Artanis sighed loudly and shook her head. "It isn't you that ruined things," she said. "That was a damned inconsiderate thing for Saeros to say. The idiot, I'd love nothing more than to drive my fist into his smug face," she growled. It was odd how well she knew him, he thought, how she knew that violence made him feel far better than sympathy.

"I believe that's the first time I have ever heard you curse," he said, laughing softly to himself, a broad grin spreading across his face. She rolled her eyes at him but he had seen the smile tugging at her lips.

"I'm not as much of a prude as you think I am," she replied.

"I'm still waiting for you to prove me wrong on that one," he said with a laugh. "But I will admit that you have spirit. You remind me of my hunting horse."

"Only thank the Valar that I haven't been castrated as that poor creature has," Artanis said, looking over at him. There was a smile in her eyes, a certain coyness he sometimes saw there when she looked at him from beneath her long eyelashes. He almost wondered… sometimes she seemed to be flirting with him and yet he wasn't sure. But he had to admit to himself that he almost hoped for it at times. The idea…well… certain ideas didn't seem as abhorrent to him as they once had.

"I don't see what difference it makes," he replied, "seeing as you have so little interest in reproduction." He tried to keep from laughing as he said it and Artanis moved to lean against the wall opposite him, her arms still crossed over her chest, looking at him with amusement.

"Oh and here I was thinking that was you," she retorted. They smiled at one another briefly before looking away. The softly flickering light of the lanterns illuminated the elegant curve of her neck, her delicate clavicle, danced across the gentle swell of her breasts. He couldn't remember why he hadn't liked them before. She was wearing a green silk gown with a belt of hammered gold and pearls that sat low across her hips and he couldn't help but notice how lovely she looked.

He reached out, plucking a white orchid from one of the many vines that traversed the wall of the balcony, and gently tucked it into her golden hair, just above her ear. She let him do it, watching him all the while, and he stepped back, leaning against the wall once more, but she seemed suddenly uncomfortable and he thought perhaps it was him. After all, it hadn't been so many years ago that they had hated one another and this tentative friendship between the two of them was rather new.

"My apologies if I've overstepped…" he began.

"We need to talk," she interrupted him, her voice suddenly gruff, and he knew this was going to be a serious discussion and, most likely, an unpleasant one. He indicated his willingness to listen by remaining silent.

Taking a deep breath, she began, saying, "I've been having letters from my brothers, my cousins, these past few months…this past year actually."

"Oh?" He suspected that he knew what this was about.

"They are…dismayed that our union has yet to bear fruit," she told him. He turned, placing his hands on the railing of the balcony and taking a deep breath. "I've been making excuses for as long as I can," she said. "But I can't keep this up much longer. They're going to go to Thingol. They're going to demand an answer. And, they're going to be very angry."

"Then what should we do?" He asked her and she threw her hands up in the air, tears welling in her eyes in frustration, though they did not fall.

"The only thing we can do!" She exclaimed, crossing her arms tightly over her chest once more, turning to him, her gaze meeting his. "We need to… consummate this marriage. We always knew the day would come. We've put it off for a long while already."

Celeborn felt his heart sink to the bottom of his boots. He had begun, in recent months, to think that perhaps there might be some chance at happiness with her. Maybe not love, but friendship at least, and that maybe she would not be adverse to lying with him just as he was no longer opposed to the idea of lying with her. But now he could see that the idea was as loathsome to her as ever.

"I'm sorry to ask it of you," she continued. "You know I never wanted this and I know you never wanted it either. But I need…" she halted, having trouble saying it, "I need you to get me with child." She flushed red having said it. "And after…after that," she swallowed hard. "You won't ever have to touch me anymore."

"I'm not sure I can do this," Celeborn retorted, his anger beginning to grow again. He hated everything about this, hated the idea of her not being completely willing, hated the idea of her feeling obligated, hated the idea of using her as a means to an end, hated the idea of whatever child they produced being used as a political pawn. This wasn't what he wanted, this had never been what he wanted.

"Please!" Artanis was growing desperate and her desperation only put him off more and more. She paused on a moment of indecision. "Anything…. whatever you want me to do… whatever you need me to do… to make it happen…" she said, "I can do it. I _will_ do it. I'll do whatever you like."

"This isn't what I want!" He roared and she shrank back against the wall, falling silent immediately. It was rare to see fear in Artanis's eyes but he had seen it for an instant. He took a moment to rein in his anger and then shook his silver head. "I'm sorry," he told her, "I'm sorry. I know this isn't your fault."

"It's quite alright," she said, but her voice wavered on the edge of tears as she crossed her arms over her chest once more, staring away into the air off the balcony. "I know… I know this isn't what you wanted. It isn't what I wanted either."

"What did you want?" He asked her, the question sudden, and she seemed surprised by it, thinking for a long while before she answered.

"I'm not so sure now," she replied quietly, sadness in her eyes. "I…I wanted to be happy. I wanted someone who loved me, who would hold me in his arms at night and…and tell me the most fantastic tales," she laughed, a sad, forlorn laugh. "That's what I did as a child, you know," she told him. "I was always in my grandfather's library, reading all the books I could get my hands on. But I know…I know you don't like that sort of thing – books, literature, writing, stories…" her voice trailed off into silence.

"You wanted your own story," he said softly and she nodded, reaching up to wipe away tears. It was the first time she had ever cried openly before him and he felt wretched about it seeing as he was the reason for her unhappiness.

"And you?" She asked. "What did you want?"

"A woman to go on adventures with me," he replied. "Someone who would venture over the mountains, explore the depths of the forests with me, swim in the rivers, scout the wilderness. But I know that isn't your sort of thing; you don't like getting your fine clothes dirty."

"I…" she turned to look at him, some strange vulnerability in her eyes. "I used to be like that," she said, "a long time ago. That's why I came here to Middle Earth. All those stories I read… they were about far off lands… lands I longed to see."

"What happened?" He asked her. "Why did you change?"

"I…" she paused. "The kinslaying happened," she said. "And after that I was a prisoner. The bars of a jail may be made of iron, but regret, and politics, and spiteful relatives, centuries of hate, and the words of a treaty can be shackles far stronger than iron bars." Silence fell between them for a while.

"If I do this thing," he murmured, his eyes meeting hers. "Then this…this marriage cannot be undone, ever, not even by Ilúvatar himself. If I wed you in body then we will be bound to one another for all eternity. Our fëar will be inextricable. That is why I do not want this." He prayed that she would understand what he meant, that she would understand that it was not because he did not desire her but because he desired her freedom more.

"I understand," she said, nodding in reply, though she took a deep and shuddering breath. There was some emotion in the depths of her eyes that he did not recognize. "And…" he voice had cooled now, "when they go to Thingol, when they demand an explanation, then what do we do?"

"We tell the truth," he said. "We tell them we never consummated the marriage."

"Then what if it comes to war?" She asked.

"They won't be mad at each other," he said, "they'll be mad at us, mostly at me. They'll see it as my failing."

"They'll shame you," she said, concern evident in her eyes as she turned to him. "They'll make a mockery of you."

"What do I care?" He said. "I don't place much stock in the words of people who believe that forcing a woman to do something against her will is a mark of manhood."

They were silent for a long while then, but he could hear her take a deep breath and then release it before she reached over, sliding her hand across the rail of the balcony until her fingers touched his. "You have your faults, husband of mine," she said, "but you are the most honest man I've ever known."


	6. Chapter 6

**The Treaty**

Chapter 6

* * *

"Where has the prince got off to?" Mablung asked with a loud laugh as the hunting party took a brief recess. The dogs seemed to have lost the scent and were searching for it again, noses pressed to the ground as they circled the clearing, tails wagging happily in the spring air.

"Probably that stupid horse of his," Beleg laughed.

"I'll go and fetch him then," Artanis said, wheeling her chestnut mare about, cantering back through the forest. The breeze was pleasant, the sun warm upon her face, and the forest was lovely, all abloom in brilliant green leaves. Eventually she found the place, a hill sloping downward where the underbrush had clearly been trampled, and, guiding her own horse slowly through and down the slope, she soon saw exactly what she expected to see, which was her husband lying flat on his back and his horse grazing happily on clover.

He lazily raised a hand and waved as she approached and she cleared her throat, raising her head in a very aristocratic manner. She suddenly found herself overcome with worry, her mind ticking anxiously, urging her to ask him if he was alright. But, the idea embarrassed her and so instead she halted her horse by his side and said, "don't you know that everyone is waiting for you and you're holding up the hunt?"

Celeborn only grinned up at her in that infuriating manner of his as she scowled down at him. What made it so infuriating was that she liked so very much to be obeyed and that little grin told her that he had no intention of abiding by anything that she said. "Come down and join me," he said, toying idly with a clover flower.

"I absolutely will not!" Artanis replied, giving him what she hoped was a suitably reproachful look. "And we ought to be on our way," she said, but she hadn't put much feeling into the words, perhaps because out here alone in the forest everything felt so much more peaceful, so much calmer, away from the hustle and bustle, the gossip and expectations of courtiers.

Since Celeborn seemed to be showing no inclination towards moving, she reached down and, with a sigh of dissatisfaction, brushed a hand across the royal blue and gold brocade of her riding habit, picking loose some stray twigs and leaves that had gotten caught up on her clothing as she rode through the thicket.

"Soiled your fine clothes have you, Princess?" Celeborn's sarcastic tone caught her ears and she shot him a searing glance of anger, though it was really more in good fun than true anger.

"At least I'll never be as filthy as you," she retorted.

"You give yourself too little credit," Celeborn replied. "With enough practice you could perhaps rival me."

"Rival you?" She spat out before she had quite caught his full meaning. But Celeborn laughed, pleased that he had provoked her competitive nature. "I'm not even sure if I want to know what you meant by that," she said in an effort to recoup some of her pride, straightening her seat in the saddle and looking down her nose at him.

He was decidedly nonplussed, crossing his arms behind his head. His silver hair was spread out across the clover and he had undone the top few fastenings of his dusky red tunic, the collar of his shirt open as well, and the gold of the afternoon sun fell softly upon the tanned skin of his chest. Artanis swallowed and averted her eyes. He really was very handsome. Her Noldorin sensibilities rebelled at the thought. But why shouldn't she think him handsome? Even amongst the princes of Aman he would have been counted very handsome. She looked back at him, her eyes alighting, as it seemed they so frequently did, upon his mouth. He had a nice mouth. His lips… she blushed remembering the morning after their wedding and that kiss.

"Cat got your tongue, Artanis?" Celeborn asked. She took a breath, trying to steady herself. But it seemed all she could do was stare at his lips, at that flashing white grin.

"Why can't you come along?" She hissed, cross with him, cross with him for being so handsome and having such a very nice mouth.

"They're not waiting," he said. "They never wait. They'll continue on without us."

"Well I'm not about to be left behind all because you got thrown from your horse," she spat.

"Suit yourself," Celeborn shrugged, but now Artanis was stuck in a quandary because she certainly did not intend to go but he had called her bluff.

A slow grin spread across Celeborn's face as he realized his triumph. "Oh don't be so sullen my dear," he said. "Today is the very last day you have to be married to me. Tomorrow you'll be a free woman after we tell Thingol our little secret. Can't you let me have one last victory?"

Artanis only glowered at him. The thought had lain heavy on her mind of course, but not for the reasons he presumed. She had taken a gamble in telling him of her cousins' letters, a gamble that she had lost. Because Artanis's deepest secret was not that they had not consummated the marriage, but that now some part of her _wanted_ to consummate the marriage, or at least that's what she thought she was feeling. She could have sworn…she had thought that just perhaps he had wanted it to, or at least that he has shown interest in her. They had been getting along quite well lately after all. And it wasn't that they fought any less…per say…but that they now liked the fighting.

"Come on," Celeborn sprang to his feet, that wild grin on his face once more. "I want to see something instead of this sour face of yours."

"Excuse me?" She hurled the words at him as he mounted his horse and wheeled the creature about.

"You keep telling me all these tall tales about how you used to be some great adventuress, about how you wanted to travel to far off lands, and about how you weren't always a prude."

"I have _always_ been a prude," she corrected him, "just not as much of one as you think!"

He laughed. "And what about the rest of it?" He asked.

"I did used to go on adventures!" She retorted, their horses circling one another now.

"Then race me," he said, his green eyes narrowed, shining with the spirit of competition. "Race me to the river."

"That's indecent," she hissed.

"Prude," he retorted. His green eyes glimmered with mischief. "Liar," he whispered with a shark-like grin. "You said your grandmother was a great horsewoman…" and her pride could bear no more. Her eyes widened as she brought he ends of her reins slapping across her horse's rump and went tearing off through the trees.

She found a path in no time, her horse galloping over the soft grass, the dappled sunlight flickering by as they ran beneath the tall canopy of bright green birch leaves. She heard the hooves of Celeborn's horse behind, his laughter, and could not help the smile that blossomed on her face. The wind whipped through her hair, the sunlight fell soft upon her face, and all of her cares seemed to slip away with the breeze. And she was far, far, so very far from the reach of her cousins. It was the first time in a very long time that she had felt like the girl she used to be, before the Helcaraxë, before the death on the docks of Alqualondë.

A wild whoop of joy escaped her as she spurred her horse on, but Celeborn had pulled alongside now, the bay gelding's long stride proving that he was every bit the hunter they had thought he would be. "Think you're going to beat me?" Celeborn shouted and she laughed.

"I know I'll beat you!" she crowed, a fierce smiling lighting her face. He turned one of those grins of his towards her as they hurtled round the bend, the blue ribbon of the river coming into sight at last. Artanis bent low over her horse's neck as they raced down into a hollow of birch trees, down a gentle slope and towards the river. They were mere moments away when Celeborn went hurtling by her, devoid of his horse, to land in a heap at the base of a tree. Artanis paused for a moment, startled, worried that he had been injured when his horse threw him, but he looked up, flashing another grin at her, and began to stumble towards the river, still intent on his goal.

Laughing, she spurred her horse forward, not stopping until the mare's hooves had touched the water and then, secure in her victory, she came trotting back to see Celeborn laying in the clover, his disobedient horse grazing nearby.

"Given up, have you?" She asked with a satisfied smirk.

"I would have beaten you if he hadn't thrown me," Celeborn said with a broad grin and Artanis rolled her eyes.

"No you would not have," she said. "I won easily and I still would have, even had you not been thrown."

"Help me up," he said, offering his hand, "or I shall refuse to conceded defeat."

Artanis looked down her nose at him, wondering how one man managed so many grins, and could not help but grin a little herself. "You're such a sore loser," she grumbled, reaching down, and Celeborn caught her hand. But, instead of standing, he gave a hard tug and she found herself toppling from the saddle to land on the ground beside him with a shriek.

"You idiot!" She cried. "That hurt! Suppose my foot had gotten caught in the stirrup. You could have snapped my ankle!" But all Celeborn did was laugh and she had to give him a few punches for good measure.

"So it's true!" He crowed gleefully. "I thought I saw some wildness in you at the start and it's true, it's there."

"I've been telling you it was true all along!" She protested, laughing. "You're so stubborn, do you know that?"

"You're even more stubborn!" He protested, laughing, stray tendrils of silver hair coming loose from his ponytail, looking down at her with those green eyes as brilliant as summer leaves but with some dark remembrance of the stars. And then, she wasn't sure how she knew it was going to happen, but she did know it would, he closed his eyes, that beautiful mouth of his pausing for just a moment over hers, a pause in which she could easily have pushed him away, a pause in which she knew exactly what he was about to do but did not stop him, and in the next moment his lips were upon hers, soft, and warm, and somehow firm at the same time.

And the way he kissed, oh the way he kissed…she couldn't have described it in all her life but he kissed as if it was the last thing he would ever do in all of Arda. He tasted like the woods, and salt spray, and berries in summer. And his lips…there was something sensual about them, luxurious she would have said, about the way they plied her own, how readily they caused her to open her mouth to him. The touch of his tongue upon hers sent a shock trembling down the length of her spine and she wanted more, and more, and more. Somehow the kiss wasn't stopping and it was far more than a single kiss now, but a never-ending stream of them, or else one long kiss filled with kisses.

She wanted him. She wanted him in a way that would have made the elders of Valinor blush in scandal, but she didn't know the words for her desire and so her hands did the telling, pulling at the clasps of his tunic, tugging the hem of his shirt from his breeches. And he was tearing at the laces of her bodice, his lips at her throat now, and she hadn't known she was capable of the sort of noises she was making now. The only thing she knew was that she wanted that glorious mouth of his on every part of her body.

She gasped, her heart hammering in her chest as she felt him reach beneath her skirts, the touch of his fingers against the inside of her thigh, and their eyes met, astounded, unreadable. The sound of the king's hunting trumpets and the clamor of horses on the path above broke the tenuous silence. Celeborn leapt back, stuffing his shirt back into his breeches, fastening the clasps of his tunic, breathing hard, clearly rattled, his eyes wide. Artanis hadn't thought it was possible to startle the ever-assured prince but he was most certainly startled.

She leapt to her feet as well, pulling her petticoats back down, lacing her bodice back up as quickly as she could, pulling stray leaves from her hair. They turned, staring at each other for a moment and she had no idea what it was that she was in the depths of Celeborn's eyes, no idea what had just passed between them, and it was clear enough that he had no idea either. He turned away, putting a hand over his mouth, stifling a muffled roar before he drove his fist into a nearby tree. Artanis flinched, confused as to the cause of this unexpected anger.

"We go to the King tomorrow," Celeborn said, wheeling about to face her, his green eyes burning, and this was the first time she had ever seen him truly angry. "We go to the King tomorrow and we end this. I can't spend another moment with you, do you hear? I want this finished." The clamor on the road grew louder and they mounted their horses once more, riding out to meet the King's entourage.

It was late by the time the hunting party returned to Menegroth and they had passed the hours in complete silence, not even daring to look at one another, even as they at last adjourned to their rooms that night. Heart shattered around her feet, Artanis, quickly made to head for her own room but Celeborn's hand on her elbow stopped her and she turned, meeting his eyes at last, trying her hardest to disguise the shame and sadness that ate at her.

"I'm sorry for what happened, for my anger," Celeborn stammered, still looking shaken even after the long hours of silence that had passed. But Artanis found herself unable to reply, and merely nodded, quickly adjourning to her rooms and the one comfort left to her: her book.

The candles burned low in their crystal candlesticks and yet, despite all of the pages of this book that she had filled over the years, the single blank page that lay open before her was the most intimidating of all. Her quill sat idle in the inkwell as she slowly thumbed through the hundreds of pages that she had already written. They all led up to this point, each one of them telling a bit more of the story, and this page, this was the climax, the page that all other pages had naturally led to, the one page that tied all of it together.

But writing it would make it real, would force her to acknowledge it for the truth that it was and, therefore, lay her heart completely bare to the pain of inevitable rejection, to the horrible humiliation of being scorned for this unthinkable thing, earning even more than she already had the derision of her cousins.

And yet, hadn't he already rejected her? She had thought that perhaps there was a chance that he had called off the marriage because he thought it was what she wanted, because he had hoped to save her from a lifetime spent in a marriage that he believed she did not want. She had thought that if he saw she wanted it too…then maybe he would reveal that he too desired this.

But instead he had been furious with her and she had been forced to acknowledge that he did not want this, that he was calling off the marriage because he was the one who could no longer stand being married to her, because he didn't want her to be the woman who bore his children, because he couldn't stand an eternity by her side. So all of the signs she had seen…they must all have been figments of her imagination, all the little things that she had believed meant he loved her at last. Tears were brimming in her eyes and she reached up, wiping them away, determined not to delay any longer. Tomorrow it would be over. Tomorrow everyone would know. Tomorrow she would be returned to her brothers.

The blank page was waiting for her and, at last, she took up the quill, blotting the ink before she wrote the three simple words.

 _I love him._

The words stared up at her from the page, real, concrete, undeniable, a simple declaration, with the legacy of empires weighing upon them, and she took a deep breath.

She reached out, her fingers tracing the words. How strange, she thought, that she had hated this marriage so ardently but now she wanted him more than anything. And, just when she was beginning to realize it at last was when he had at last made his move to end the union. She had always known this would never end well, she had just never expected that this would be the way it would end.


	7. Chapter 7

"Good night!" Celeborn shouted after the slamming door, receiving no reply from his wife. Maybe she hadn't heard him. Maybe she had. Maybe she hadn't slammed the door after all, or maybe she had, or maybe she had just shut it harder than intended.

He clenched his fists, feeling the urge to hit something again, but his knuckles still ached from the tree he had punched earlier. He had never before worried himself over whether or not a woman replied to him when he wished her good night, and he had certainly never pondered the thought of whether or not a woman had accidentally or intentionally slammed a door when leaving his presence.

But now, with Artanis he felt as if he was reading into every little sign, every action, every word, the very inflection of her voice, all trying to find some possible glimmer of hope that she might love him. Sometimes he thought he saw it in the light of her eyes, in a glimpse of her smile, but there was always some reservation in her gaze that made him think twice, that made him sure that all of the little signs he thought he had seen were nothing more than figments of his imagination.

He had tried to read for a bit, but all he could imagine was her poking fun at him, acting surprised that he could read after all. When they had first married she hadn't meant it as a joke, but as genuine scorn, and he had responded with anger and vitriol against Noldorin pride and false superiority. But now she did it only in jest and he replied with laugher, playing along, turning his books upside down and squinting at them.

"These squiggles are too difficult for my Moriquendi eyes to read," he would say, sometimes adopting a silly voice.

"Stop it!" She would gasp, laughing and blushing furiously, slapping him lightly on the arm or else tugging on his braid. "Don't call yourself that!" But those thoughts only made him melancholy as he contemplated what he must do tomorrow, how he must tell Thingol that they had never consummated the marriage and then how she would be sent back to her brothers and he would likely never see her again. He wanted her more than anything except her freedom.

Hoping to find refuge in sleep, he had adjourned to his bedchamber but that had provided no relief. His memory still burned with the heat of her lips, of her body, his fingers were seared with the indelible feel of her flesh, and yet he had tried as hard as he could to purge himself of the memories. His heart ached with guilt. He knew that she thought he was angry with her when truly he was furious with himself for taking advantage of her situation. It had been such a damnably stupid thing to do.

He didn't know what had caused him to kiss her, except yes, yes he did know. There was some magic about her when she smiled that lit up her eyes like a thousand suns. And the arguing…well he enjoyed the arguing now. It had almost become a form of banter, a sort of verbal foreplay that made him feel things he had never expected to feel for her. And she had looked so unbelievably beautiful that his baser instincts had completely overwhelmed him.

And she… why else would she have gone along with it if it weren't for the pressure from her cousins? He knew she didn't like this plan of telling Thingol that they had never consummated the marriage. He knew she feared the anger of her cousins, feared the ridicule that he would face in response, feared the possibility of war erupting between their peoples, and yet he would rather face all of that than bind her to this marriage she did not want. Even today he had been reminded of how happy she was when she was free and then he, like a blithering idiot, had taken advantage of her happiness, had forced himself on her simply because he could not resist.

Here he had told her he was not that sort of man, that he wanted her freedom for her, that he would never bind her to this marriage she despised, but then his actions had proven what a liar he was, that he would have ruined her life all for the sake of a few moments of pleasure. He was unable to eviscerate the thoughts from his mind, and even more impossible to quench was the desire for her that still burned so strongly within him, but at last he fell into a shallow sleep, a sleep filled with dreams where she was ready and willing and in love with him.

It was the soft flickering of candlelight that woke him, slowly at first, a faint glow, and he blinked his eyes open, struggling for a moment to make sense of why it was not yet day and what was in front of him, or rather who. And when his eyes cleared of sleep at last, he thought for a moment that he was still dreaming. For there, sitting at his side, was Artanis, and she was wearing nothing but a very thin silk robe. Wordlessly, she pushed the candle onto the nearby table and then stood.

"We don't need to keep up this façade any longer," he said, sitting up, his throat dry, wondering what on earth she was doing here. "We're going to Thingol tomorrow…." But he got no further before with trembling fingers she reached for the silken cord about her waist and pulled it, causing the robe to slide from her shoulders to pool about her feet.

She said nothing, merely staring at him with wide eyes as if she feared his rejection while he watched the gentle rise and fall of her breathing, the way the gold of the candlelight slid over her skin, caught in the light of her hair. Her body was perfect and he wanted to explore every inch of it with his mouth, to taste the gentle swell of her breasts, her slender waist, the soft curves of her hips. His fingers still retained the heat of the tender skin between her legs and now his hands hungered to finish what he had begun in the forest.

He could not now recall what his objections to her had been all of those years ago, why he had been repelled by her faults yet unable to see the seeds of good within her, and why… why oh why he had ever thought her anything other than perfectly, gorgeously, ethereally, magnificent. He knew he was staring and yet he found that he did not care, not at all.

Her eyes met his for a nervous instant as she reached for the blankets, pulling them aside, and he made room for her, inviting her into his bed though he knew he shouldn't, even though he knew how this would end, and she climbed in, bringing one long elegant leg over him so that she was straddling his lap now. He reached out, mesmerized, not knowing what to say, half believing that he was still dreaming. His fingers seemed to act over their own accord as they pulled free the ivory silk ribbon that had bound her braid. Her golden hair spilled about her shoulders, falling to her hips, and the pearls that she had bound in the silken strands came loose, flying free, glimmering in the candlelight midflight and bouncing across the floor of his bedchamber until their echoes slowly faded.

"Artanis," he gasped, his chest rising and falling in ragged breaths.

"Celeborn," she whispered, half a question, her eyes still wide, hands trembling, and whatever self-control he had retained seemed to snap in an instant at the sound of his name on her lips. Her hands were shaking but he caught them in his own, gathering her in his arms and tumbling her gently to the soft sheets beneath him. Need was pulsing through him now, a wail of want in his veins, with even greater intensity that the desire he had felt in the forest.

His hands were shaking not with fear but with anticipation long deferred as his fingers returned to that same place they had abandoned in the forest, sliding slowly up the smooth skin of her inner thigh. She trembled beneath his touch, a soft gasp escaping her, and he felt a trail of goose bumps blossom beneath his fingertips. Then, as his fingers reached their destination she stifled her gasp by reaching up to cradle his face in her hands, pressing her lips to his. He eagerly obliged, tongue mimicking the slow but steady movements of his fingers, and she tasted of honey in the springtime: fresh and clean.

Celeborn wished he could say that he was a better man, that he had not done it, but even the strictest ascetic would have been sorely tempted and Celeborn had never had the makings of a monk. All he knew was the heat of her soft skin against him, the taste of her lips, the feel of her fingers that fumbled to free him of his breeches and her gentle hands that stroked him to readiness. As he had predicted, she did not bleed, not that he cared or could even think of such a trivial detail when he felt as if the whole world lay before him in the depths of her blue eyes that brimmed with some strange emotion mixed with pleasure.

She was magnificent as only she could be, her golden hair spread across the pillows, glimmering like a river of sunlight, her skin glowing gold in the candlelight, pink from the flush of excitement, and their eyes met in startled awe but no words passed between them. It almost seemed as if there was so much to say that they were not able to find the words. And yet they did not need them, for the movements of their bodies spoke volumes that mere syllables could express.

There was some sort of power to her, in the way that noises he had never thought to hear her make slipped past her lips unabated, in the set of her hips against his own, in the alluring pride that seemed to be captured in every curve of her body, in the way that she traced his spine, fingers starting at his neck, moving slowly downward, exploring every little crevice until she came to his waist, and further down still until she grasped his hip, rolling her own hips up and pulling him deeper.

He would have thought that she would be more reserved, shy almost about this, prudish, as he had expected, and yet it seemed that she luxuriated in it, seeming to have lost herself in a way, or perhaps she had found herself after all, the look in her eyes so reminiscent of the spark of freedom that had lit them as they raced towards the river.

And whatever light it was grew, filling her until it seemed as if she glowed with it. A brief moment of confusion flickered through her eyes, as if she wasn't sure what was about to happen, but in the next instant she had surrendered to it and then he felt some almighty force surround him, as if he had been caught in a tide and was being drawn into the ocean, filled not with a feeling of terror, but with the fantastic, as if he were going home, surrounded by the silence of the depths of the sea, just the two of them as time slowed to a halt for the span of a moment and then, slowly, like the tide, that moment began to ebb and they collapsed, sweating and trembling from the force of mutual destruction, into each other's arms.

They said nothing for a long while, foreheads pressed together, gazes gently resting on each other, his hands cradling her face as hers cradled his, looking at each other as though they could not believe what they had just done. Then she kissed him again, slowly this time, and joy curled in his stomach at the fullness of her lips against his, the feel of the edge of her tongue against his own, her hands tangled in his hair. They did not tire of kissing for a while, and yet whatever it was that had happened, the formation of the bond or the rest of it, had caused him to feel more exhausted than he had ever felt, not the painful exhaustion that accompanies battle, but the pleasant comfort that comes just before a long rest.

"You didn't turn out to be a prude either," he murmured, losing the battle to keep his eyes open. Nothing in the world seemed to matter except her golden head resting on his chest and the gentle rise and fall of her breathing. She laughed, and he felt her mouth stretching into a smile against his bare skin. "Won't you let me maintain even one of my misconceptions?" He asked her.

"Not a single one," she whispered back, her eyes fluttering shut as well, and if she said anything else then he didn't hear it, for the world of dreams had claimed him at last.


	8. Chapter 8

**The Treaty**

Chapter 8

* * *

When Artanis awoke it was to find herself in Celeborn's arms, nestled against his body, his skin warm against hers, and she smiled in contentment, closing her eyes, listening to the beat of his heart in his chest. For the first time in a very long time she felt entirely at peace, as if all was right with the world, as though she had attained some happiness and safety that no one could now take from her.

She opened her eyes again with a joyful little sigh, the dappled light of late morning filtering down from Menegroth's enchanted ceiling, to glimmer against the gold-veined emerald leaves and fall softly upon their skin. Artanis smiled, her hand light upon her husband's chest, rising and falling with his slow measured breathing. His long hair, silver and straight as the edge of a blade, spilled across the pillows and she wrapped a lock of it about her finger, her face flushing with heat ever so slightly as she recalled the previous evening.

She could hardly believe that she had once thought such a thing would be a horrendous ordeal. Well…perhaps it would have been when she had disliked him so very much. But it was hard now to remember how things had been when she had found him so loathsome because now she thought him the single most handsome man in all of Arda, and not just that, but there was no one else who could make her laugh, make her smile, make her feel as free as he did.

And there had been nothing, absolutely nothing repulsive about lying with a Sinda. She bit her lip as she recalled the feel of his lips, the way his body fit so well against hers, his big but gentle hands that had coaxed countless gasps from her.

But of course the best part of it all was that he had reciprocated. What she had done had been the result of a desperate and foolish plan, and yet as she had sat alone in her rooms, the thought of never knowing for certain what he felt for her and the looming possibility of losing him forever had torn her heart asunder. Whatever pride she felt had seemed so inconsequential and she had still feared his rejection, but the possibility of discovering that he loved her had outweighed her fear and driven her at last to his bed and to her joy he had welcomed her there.

The bond they had formed was strange but wonderful, and she could feel his dreams flitting through her own mind now, rather like hearing a conversation from a distance, and she pressed a gentle kiss to his shoulder as he shifted in his sleep. Today felt so full of promise, of new beginnings.

"Now is the hour of the oak. The King approaches!"

It was the cry of the herald and the clamor of doors being thrown open that shocked her from her happy reverie and she sat up, startled, feeling Celeborn jolt awake beside her. Until this moment everything had seemed surreal, like some sort of dream, but now everything felt very real, almost unbearably real.

Celeborn sat up with a jolt, staring at her, wide-eyed in shock, his face so close to her own, and then his eyes suddenly turned cold, distant, anger pulsing through them for a moment, but she didn't need to look at him to perceive the way he felt, for she could now feel his emotions moving amongst her own, like fish in a shared stream, and a ripple of rage belonging to him seared through her heart. "You seduced me!" He spat, his shoulders trembling with fury just barely contained.

"No!" She whispered, feeling her dreams crashing down around her, but she had no time to say anything else and they had only just enough time to pull the sheets up around them, but not enough time to extricate themselves from their naked embrace, before Thingol mounted the stairs in such a fit of anger that even Celeborn quailed at the sight of him as the two of them huddled together against the approaching storm.

"Celeborn, this arrived today. Would you care to explain…" Thingol began, his voice a deep roll of thunder, but he came to a sudden halt as he reached the top step and looked up, his eyes going wide and then softening at the sight before him. His eyes fixed upon Celeborn's neck and when Artanis turned to look it was plain to see why. The prince's skin was marked with a trail of little livid purple bruises and Artanis flushed a deep red as she recalled how she had made them the night before.

"Oh," Thingol said simply, as if he could not think of anything else to say, or else as if he had been shocked into silence. "Ah…" he let his hand fall to his side, the letter forgotten now along with the questions it had incited. "Well I suppose that the rumors were unfounded then after all," the King said, having the decency to appear somewhat ashamed at the situation he had just interrupted. "I ah…" he laughed, "I'll leave you to it then shall I?" And he turned to go, nearly stumbling over the pearls that were strewn all about the bedroom floor, but Celeborn interrupted him.

"What rumors?" The Prince asked, pulling the sheet around him as he made to stand, forcing Artanis to grab hold of it and pull back in the opposite direction so that she would not be left completely unclothed before the King. Celeborn turned to look at her, surprised, as if he had nearly forgotten she was there, and seated himself again as Artanis huddled more securely beneath the sheet. It was all horribly embarrassing and she wished more than anything that Thingol would leave, that Celeborn hadn't involved him in further conversation. She was certain her entire body must have turned beet red in shame by now.

Thingol had sensed her embarrassment and looked awkwardly between her and Celeborn. "Well…there was some speculation that the marriage had never been consummated," the King said, "and Artanis's cousins have also lodged this complaint…" he briefly raised the letter he held in his hand, "but I can see that that is not the case."

"No, that is not the case," Celeborn said stiffly. "The marriage is indeed a marriage of both vows and flesh, as you can well see."

"That I can indeed," Thingol said again with an awkward laugh. "A fortunate thing for your wife." He looked at her apologetically, gesturing with the letter. "The other marriage prospects they proposed for her were all rather unsavory characters. My apologies," he said as he retreated down the stairs, "particularly to you, Artanis. I did not mean to intrude. I am rather used to finding him on his own."

But Artanis merely swallowed hard, pulling the sheet ever the more tightly around her and closed her eyes, trying to steady her mind, but it wasn't helping matters that she could feel the heat of Celeborn's body pressed up against hers and the slow pulsing anger beating through his heart and into her own. So she had been wrong about all of it. He didn't love her after all and his fury with her now was ample proof of that. Last night…it had been nothing more than simple lust. It had felt like more than that…she had thought it was more…but then what would she know? She'd never done anything like that before.

The sound of the door closing at last behind the King and his entourage was a mercy but being left to face Celeborn's wrath was not, and he turned on her nearly as soon as Thingol had quit the room, his eyes cold and hard. "You seduced me," he hissed, his voice tight with tension. "And now I know why at last. You knew they were going to marry you off to someone else didn't you? That was what you hoped to avoid." He rubbed his hands over his forehead. "Dammit Artanis! I knew you were frightened of your cousins…but to this extent…to do this…"

"I knew nothing of it!" She insisted but he was livid and Artanis could feel desperation trying to claw its way out of her as she reached for his hands but he tore them away.

"Who was it?" He asked, eyes swimming with rage. "Who were they going to marry you to that you hoped to avoid?"

"Celeborn I knew nothing of it, I swear!" She insisted, swallowing the sobs that threatened to rise in her throat. And perhaps this was even more terrible than being parted from him, this being married to a man, having shared her body with a man, who loved her not at all and whose kind regard had now turned to anger and hatred.

He took a deep breath but it seemed do to nothing whatsoever to steady his nerves. "You've ruined the both of us! You tricked me into wedding you against your will!"

"I was not unwilling!" She pleaded with him, her chest tight.

"Not unwilling is a far cry from willing!" Celeborn shouted. "And what does that make me?" His eyes were intense and unflinching as they bored into hers. "I hate myself for what I've done to you!"

"Celeborn I was willing!" She cried, the beginnings of tears rising to her eyes now. "And you didn't exactly protest!"

He clenched his jaw in anger and she felt as if she were about to choke on her heart. "What do you mean you were willing?" He asked, his voice a low growl.

"I mean I…I wanted it!" Centuries of indoctrination to refrain from stating such things caused her to flush red in shame as she said it. What pride she had left was completely ruined by the confession and yet she felt she owed him some explanation for what she had done. The idea was beginning to dawn on her that she had bound him to her for all eternity, that he would now never be able to know happiness with someone. The thought had not occurred to her the night before, but now it had and it made what she had done seem extraordinarily selfish.

"Wanted _it_ ," Celeborn spat, "not _me_. You wanted your safety, your marriage, the protection of my kingdom from your cousins, from the marriage to someone potentially _lower_ in your eyes than even I am."

"No!" Artanis cried, tears spilling from her eyes at last as she took a long shuddering sob. "I did it because…because I wanted _you_ only I was afraid to say…"

"And your solution was to crawl into my bed in the middle of the night and seduce me?" His voice was laced with anger and, ashamed of herself, she nodded, reaching up to wipe the tears away but they did not stop.

"I saw no other way!" She cried. "I thought that if you loved me you would accept and that if you did not then you would decline. Celeborn, I'm so very sorry for what I've done! I never…I never, never would have done it if I thought you would do it without loving me!"

Celeborn stared at her with a hard look for a long minute and she could tell that he did not believe her as he shook his head and rose from the bed as if he meant to quit the room. "Celeborn please," desperately she reached for his hand, catching it. "Please!" She pleaded. "Wait but a minute and I will prove it to you!"

He eyed her suspiciously for a moment but, wordlessly, seated himself on the bed once more while she rushed to her rooms, gathering up the book in her arms and returning to thrust it into his hands. "Here," she said, the desperation she felt bleeding through into her voice. "Here, it's all in here."

He looked at her for a moment with eyes that spoke of betrayal, but after a moment he sighed heavily and opened the book. He stared at it for a moment and then looked up at her once more. "I can't read it," he said simply, a thread of sadness running through his voice, and Artanis sat down heavily on the bed, as if the wind had been knocked out of her. This had been it, her grand plan to prove to him that she loved him, and yet she had stupidly forgotten that he could not read Quenya. She felt her heart shatter to smithereens at her feet, the tears flowing freely as she began to sob, pulling the blankets up around her, wishing the earth would simply open and swallow her.

"Why are you crying?" She heard him ask her, his voice weary, most of the anger gone now, sadness having taken its place.

"Because I've done a terrible thing," she said. In the wake of tragedy, lies and pride were too difficult to maintain and so she spoke the truth instead. "I wanted you for myself and so I bound you to me against your will. And I was so very stupid that I wrote everything in Quenya. And now I'm ashamed that you've seen my body."

"Won't you come out?" She heard him ask as she felt him pulling gently on the blankets, but she shook her head and refused.

"A moment," she pleaded and heard him sigh again, the sound of him slowly turning the pages. She needed a moment before she could bear to look at him again.

And then she heard an intake of breath, soft, but she had heard it all the same. "I know these words…" Celeborn said, his voice trailing off into silence, and there had been no anger in his voice, nor any weariness, but instead his words had been filled with…hope…incredulity…

Taking a deep breath, Artanis pulled the blankets down from over her head. She could not see through her own tears and so she wiped them away, opening her eyes to see that he had turned to the last page she had written, his fingers tracing the three words in the middle of the paper: _I love him_.

"These ones I can read," he said again, his voice gruff, his eyes meeting hers, questioning, unsure, and she swallowed hard again. Silence followed, a silence in which they merely stared at one another, afraid to say anything.

"Are they true?" He asked at last and she nodded, trembling now, her grip on the sheets relaxing a bit.

"They're true," she said, her voice a hoarse whisper after all of the sobbing, her heart a dull and despondent beat in her chest. Now came the part where he would look upon her with pity and tell her how he did not feel the same and how very sorry he was about it. She wasn't sure if she could endure that.

He swallowed hard, seeming unsure of what to do, and then at last he said, "well I suppose that I cannot be angry with you anymore, not when I am guilty of the same sin."

"What do you mean?" She asked, her heart pounding a thousand beats per minute in her chest.

"Wait," he said, standing, clasping her hands for a moment, and then he was gone, returning a moment later with a small chest. Climbing onto the bed, he threw the lid open and Artanis saw that it was crammed full with scraps of paper. He began to pull them out, frantically almost, unfolding each one, spreading them out on the bed, and Artanis gasped, her heart stopping dead in her chest.

In carefully, painstakingly printed Tengwar, on every little scrap of paper, it read: _I love her_. It was undoubtedly his handwriting, the same way as he had written in the book, each letter so carefully printed and yet helplessly sloppy. "I…I got a little better as I went on…" he said, flashing her a small hopeful grin as he spread out the notes. "These were the first ones I wrote," he gestured to a few that were terribly misspelled, "and these were yesterday…" he pushed a stack of correctly written ones towards her.

Artanis could do nothing save laugh through her tears, her heart soaring from the depths of sorrow to the peaks of joy. "Oh my froward savage," she gasped, still laughing, her hands going to his face, brushing the silver hair back from his eyes, "I do love you so very much."

"My prideful little prude," he whispered, his eyes meeting hers as he took her hands, "I love you just as much." And this time when he kissed her she knew exactly the reason why.


End file.
